Winding, grinding, drove into a pole: Warrant issued for suspect in power outage following pursuit

ALTON – A warrant has been issued following a police chase ending with a crash against a power pole in Alton just before 5 p.m. Thursday.

Billy J. McCane, 31, of the 1200 block of Wills St. in Alton, was charged with one count of aggravated fleeing or attempting to elude a police officer and one count of unlawful possession of methamphetamine following the Thursday afternoon chase. The pursuit ended with McCane's vehicle crashing into a power pole in the 800 block of Union in Alton, which caused as many as 656 customers of Ameren Illinois to lose power. As many as 513 of those customers had power re-routed to their homes just after 6 p.m. The remaining 143 customers regained power by 3:45 a.m.

McCane was accused of eluding police at as much as 21 miles pe hour over the speed limit while carrying less than five grams of a substance containing methamphetamine.

A representative of Ameren Illinois said the customer will have to pay for the new power pole and transformer following the incident.

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